I’ve been pinning quite a few contenders but today was an actual in store encounter. Here are the findings:

First and foremost: bridal store lighting is universally horrible.

Second, an Alfred Sung that I thought I’d pinned it but apparently not so just added it (the back is pinned [literally, I'm not talking pinterest, I'm talking needles] which is why it’s awkwardly gathered).

Third, another Alfred Sung from the pinterest board:

Another  Alfred Sung in an almost distractingly unflattering to my pale skin color (my husband came in while I was writing this and say he can’t look at me in this dress because it is so horrible):

And lastly, a Bill Levkoff that I can’t find online because the style number on the tag that I wrote down aren’t the same as the ones online (ANNOYING!) but it’s pretty close to this:

Okay now the most frustrating aspect. The first two dresses looked the best in the store but since they were size 12s, they looks super crappy in the photos and the one that was just okay in the store look but (I think) best in the photo since it was an 8 (yes, I just proclaimed my dress size on the internet). The blue one is a great concept but was also a 12 and not a flattering color and kind of a hot mess in both the photo and the store.

And here are some of the fabric swatches:

Now obviously this is the internet and not color accurate but we’re looking at the purples and the green. I think I like Italian Plum the best but can’t quite tell the difference between that and the Paradise. I normally would gravitate towards the green but I have a minor fear about looking like the Jolly Green Giant next to the bride. Fear not, though, Bride, I look great in both green and purple! Jewel tones and bright colors work with my albino ways.

What are your thoughts, dear internet? And if you know of other dresses I should check out let me know!

(via Reddit)

(Photo by Modern Toile Photography)

Marriage in anybody’s life can be termed as a big ticket to happiness, bliss and love. People often flaunt lots of money and even spend everything for the sake of having a fairy tale wedding. Indeed a fairly tale wedding do comes with expensive price tag, which may appear a distant dream for you to have. However, the days of magnificence, splendor and champagne is seems to have passed since more and more people are looking forward to have a modest wedding, which can save money. In other words people want budget friendly weddings. Thanks to the economical downturn, people are interested in saving every buck to secure their future or life. Now it’s possible to have budget friendly marriages. The following are useful ideas which can make your wedding budget friendly.

Plan the ceremony in off season

If you are planning for pocket friendly budget, then its better you select the busiest date of the calendar and get things done on an off season wedding. This will certainly save your extra money you put in your wedding. Generally the couple prefer to marry somewhere between October and February. This is the time when the prices are high of almost everything, right from the locations, florists, limousines and so on. So to have a good and economical deal better have your wedding during the off season months.

Go for a beautiful morning or early afternoon marriage party

If you want to have buffets, full-fledged dinner and unlimited champagne and wine, better schedule your wedding in the day time. This will help you save lots of money, since marriages at night are a costly business. You have to put lots of money for the dinner and nonstop wine, which would be really hard to meet if you are looking forward to have a budge wedding. If you host a beautiful morning or early afternoon feast, you will certainly have a wedding within your budget limit.

Schedule a destination wedding

Well how about having your marriage somewhere in other city away from your hometown which has lots of friends and relatives. This can be made possible only when you want to invite limited number of guests and just want an inexpensive wedding at any cost. The destination wedding helps to slash down the expenses to a huge level since you have limited guests which eventually mean less money spent on food and wine. This is the best way to alleviate your wedding cost.

Work out some cost cutting decoration ideas

When comes to wedding reception, you are out to be pinched by lots of money. However, you can have a pocket friendly reception, provided you work out cost cutting decoration ideas. Hence plan your decoration beneficially, cut down the high cost on flowers, reduce the large size bouquets into smaller ones. Regardless of the size, the flowers after all will fall into trash bin only. Think of the areas where you can save money, and put the same amount on things which your guest would recall- the food. Lastly, go for budget friendly lighting.

Final Word

We live in an economical crush era, where every single buck counts. But saving money doesn’t really mean that you affect the quality of your wedding and make this landmark event of your life dull and drowsy. Fortunately, there are couples of creative ways which can help you save money and have your affordable wedding. There are lots of areas where you can save your money. These money saving ideas as discussed above can help you find these avenues where curtailing your budget can offer you a budget friendly wedding. So what are you waiting for, read them, understand them and implement them to save lots of money in your marriage.

This is the first “leafy” one that I had mentioned. I think I want to do as few real-life couples so Paul + Joanne is not an option anymore but I thought of two possible names but feel free to suggest new ones!

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In case anyone had forgotten where The Future Mrs. Darcy has been lately: please see adorable baby above… Who just woke up from her name. And now the years of IMing which taught me how to type quickly come in handy. Okay– speedy: though I’ve been a bad little blogger, I’ve still been designing and selling up a storm.

The bridal and baby shower invitations were kind of gang busters (or at least it felt that way!) on Etsy in July so if you haven’t taken a look go check it out. If you are looking for something a little different than that, just let me know. I’m looking to expand that line a little more and if you leave me a good description of what you’re looking for you might just end up with custom shower invites for free! And I already have a birth announcement ready for debut but I need to make sure my recipients see it first  Next week it should be ready for internet consumption.

I also have 2 new wedding suites: Bella and Edward or Sookie and Eric (depending on your current vampire preferences) and an as-yet-unnamed modern leafy one.

Ooh I’ll go downstairs with the baby and take photos of the leafy one with my NEW CAMERA so we can get some naming started STAY TUNED.

Hello everyone! I’m still around!

I have a couple of brides hitting the big 1 month ’til the BIG DAY today (yay Anna and Theresa!) and as the last of the RSVPs trickle in one of them asked if I had any helpful hints for making a seating chart.

She already said wine would be involved in the decision process so– geez– where do you go from there?!

I had just the right number of cousins, aunts/uncles, family friend, friends to lump each group together at their own table and it seemed to work out fine. Conversely, I have been to a couple of weddings where Michael and I have been lumped into “married people who don’t fit anywhere else” tables so I’d say if you have “leftovers” like that, try and fit them with similar personalities or at the very least near the bar because, really, no one (except possibly Brandy) is going to make friends with complete strangers at a wedding.

So since I’m little to no help, does anyone have words of advice for our lovely bride-to-be?

It had something to do with 4 different (corporate) clients having summer conferences.

It had a lot to do with these (and these are only the one who’ve been printing and shipped so far! And start thinking of couples for the newest invitations suite- the green leaves in the bottom right):

(Sorry my little Canon camera has decided to take worse quality photos than an cell phone lately… I’m looking into finding a replacement)

And then a lot to do with this:

Shazaam! And thank you again to Modern Toile Photography for taking such lovely photos at my shower.

But with babies come baby things (like the shower invitations and there are more where that came from) and FREEBIES… like anyone need a birth plan? I know- at the top of everyone’s wish list but just in case:

Click on the photo above or here: http://bit.ly/birthplan to get your own.

I just finished these lovelies up!

I just realized that the last 3 times I’ve made maps the instructions have been proceeded by “My Mom thinks we should have a map.” It’s offical people, Moms love maps.

Anyway, it’s girlie now but can be switched to navy and yellow or green and navy or whatever colors you’d like to testosterone it up!

There were a couple of alternate designs which I will be posting this week as well but my gorgeous sunny day has turned a bit gray so I’m waiting to take the photos a little later.

*Unless you wear a wedding dress with a cut out pregnant belly then I may just have to. You probably know the photo. If not, google “pregnant wedding dress” at your own risk. You’ll know the image as soon as you see it. But beware, you can’t unsee it.

And then I figured y’aaaaall might need some too so ta-da:

I’ll be posting them to the site and to Etsy sometime later this week but everybody loves a preview, right?

*Her name is not Sarah “Banks”  but she’s going to the Outer Banks soon so I figured it’s a decent fake name AND it makes both of us think she should be adopted into the Fresh Prince of Bel Air family.